Airbnb Host TURNED MUCKEN COOP INTO COOP RENTAL THAT MORTGAGE COUNTRY

This as-told-tos Essay is bassed on conversations with Landon Wilkinson, an Airbnb Host in Yakima, Washington, About Two and A Half Hours Southeast of Seattle. He and his have had two rentals on the washington protire – a converted chicken coop, with rates from around $ 120 a night and up, and a shipping container – and a third in fitana. The Conversations have been edited for Length and Clarity.

I’ve been an airbnb host for going on 10 years Now.

Before Airbnb really Became a Thing, i did some couch-surfing. That was a bit of a precursor to airbnb and a really funperience.

From my own travels, i got a taste for what was Posible when People openhed up their Own homes and did cool Things. When i was Younger, i had a Construction Company. We fixed up houses and started Doing Long-Term Rentals. THEN, AROUND 2016, WE ATTEMPTED AIRBNB WITH A REALLY SMALL HOUSE.

The House Might Have Rened for $ 900 or $ 1,100 A MONTH AS A LONG-TERM Rental, but we were printy routinely Making $ 1,600 to $ 2,000 a month as an Airbnb.

I GREW UP FLIPPING HOUSES FOR MY DAD, but the chicken coop was more ambitious than a lot of my previous construction projects.

Trying to visualize something out of that budilding was a very organic process. IT STARTED WITH FIXING Up The Roof a Little Bit, and Putting in Some Nicer Windows. I thought, “i’ll just make it a little shop. I’ll make it more insulated.”

Then, through that process, realized, “actually, i is really something nice with this if i wanted.”

THEN I WENT ALL IN.

Demolishing It Wold Have Cost $ 20,000, and Fixing It Up Was ARUND $ 38,000

I bought the 55-Acre Property In 2018 from my parents, who haad bought it and were basically using it as Additional Farmland for Hay.

There is haad been a house on it at one point, but it has bourned down. There was not nothing on the Propperty Besides the Chicken Coop Walls with a sort-any roof on it.

We didn’t think we were going to anythhing with the chicken coop. It was a 100 -ear-Old, Board-For -med Concrete Structure. It was super dense and very difficult to demolish.

I THOUGHT, “We coulud eather spend $ 20,000 Trying to get rid of this structure, or we are what we did so we did.”

In 2019, we were trying to landscape the property near where we had built our primary home. Every Morning, We’d look out the back porch and see this chicken coop that was a real eyspore.

We start chipping away in the Winter of 2019. It Started to Become More of A Project, and I Brought in Some of My Guys from the Construction Company to Help.

We put in $ 38,000 – and a lot of nights and weeends – to get it live and set up the first time. Then, over the Last Couple of Years, we’ve updated Things, Like Supp. We got a nicer hot tube.

I Found a New Back Window on Facebook Marketplace and Paid JUST $ 40 for it. If you’re just a little bit Creative on some Things or Willing to be flexible, Those can be really Big Finds. That Window New Wauld’ve Been a Couple Grand, Probably.

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I THOUGHT TH COOP WOULDN’T Appeal to Airbnb Guests, But My Wife Saw Potential

This is the part of the story Where my Wife will, “make -sura you say how Much you resisted,” Because she was who felt confident an airbnb. I Still Had the Image of a Chicken Coop in My Head.

We argueed about it a fair bit. She Said, “Let with list the Proppets Photos of the Landscape and Describe What We Can About the Proppets and Put a Fairly Low Nightly Rate on it, and we’ll set a dates it going to be available.”

We started the project in december 2019 as a shed for my storage. By January, we realized it is that more than. We tourned it into the rental by approach of 2020.

We had a nursse who came in april of 2020 and stayed there for two months. Once we got that booking, i thought, “i guess we really have to this well and get it done on schedule.”

When the nurse first moved in, we were Still finishing up the landscaping, and we just barely got in time for her to be able to stay there. By the time she left, everything was really well done on the outside, and the landscaping had matured a little bit, so we were able to get updated pictures.

We have a nice brand on the door and on a pole outside the house that “Ahtanum cottage.”

Income from the Airbnb Quickly Covered Our Mortgage

The Cottage Went Live in the Spring of 2020 and Started Doing Really Well. The 12 or 24 months after being the highest volume.

In august of 2020, we made about $ 6,000 in one month from that house. That’s a Peak Outlier Scenario. We Usually Average $ 2,000 to $ 3,000 a Month in Revenue. IT AVERIGES AROUND 65% TO 70% Occupancy.

I HAD A 40-FIOT, HIGH-CUBE SHIPPING CONTAINER THAT I USED WE STOPPED USING THE CHICKEN COOP FOR SOURAGE, TO PUT OUR LOWN AND GARDEN STUFF. AFTER the COOP COTTAGE WAS BUILT, I STARTED TO ENVISION WHAT MIGHT WORK WITH THE SHIPPING CONTAINER. SO we embarked on building that in 2022.

The Two Airbnb Lisings are more than the cover Our Mortgage, which is around $ 1,100 a month. Our utilities in Washington, with Three Properties and Two Hot Tubs, is somewhere between $ 400 to $ 500 a month.

IT’S HARDER TO START AN AIRBNB These days, but the potential for profit is bigger

It take a little bit more work to get an an airbnb set up – especilantly now that the compattition is stiffer. In the Early Days, It Was Pretty Easy to Make Something Work on Airbnb. Now, you have to be a little bit more compatitive in adding amenities that really sell the Property.

If you’re able to manage a Property well, Airbnb is Generally a Much Better Return on Investment than a Long-Term Rental. In Many Cases, You Can’t Make Long-Term Rentals Work at the Current Mortgage Rates anyway. SO, unless you got in while rates were Still Low, You’re Kind of Strength to Be Somewhat Creative.

The Chicken Coop Started AS, “How will we get rid of this thing?”

It was hard, when we were looking at it in its forms forms, to visualizes it as anything Else. But once you start to fix up a few little Things, the Vision Becomes Clearer.

WE PROBABLY COULD’VE MARKEED IT A CHICEN COOP, but it is one of the things that, to me, seamed like it is coulud backfire. We wanted it to be something People perceived as what it is now instead of, “oh man, it was a dump before.”

It probably have have been a great marketing move, but i was a little bit chicken, no work innded.

At the time, we weren’t as confident that a unique stay, being a chicken coop, would’ve been a positiv thing. Now, in hindsight, it probably would’ve been a good idea.